


Desdemon

by pontoni



Category: Othello - Shakespeare
Genre: F/M, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1980-04-06
Updated: 1980-04-06
Packaged: 2018-12-01 09:48:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11483847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pontoni/pseuds/pontoni
Summary: Written in response to a particularly shriveled teacher's interpretation of why Desdemona married Othello.





	Desdemon

An augurer split open  
A white cock, seeking portents of this voyage.  
He forsaw tempests

Within the twisting entrails.  
He must have mis-read, for even I can see  
That the waves are tame

And the sky quiet. Salt breeze  
Flutters the kerchief pinned high on my bodice:  
I can almost smell

The berries 'broidered on it  
Berries bright as blood. It is my favorite gift  
From my new husband.

... When young, I thought him magic,  
A demon-soldier, sorcerer-shaped from  
Dark bitter iron.

Whenever he sat restless  
On our wooden couch I knew it was because  
A warhorse's back,

Hot with musk and battle-sweat,  
Responsive between his armored knees and thighs  
Was what he dreamed of.

Silent, entranced, I would listen  
To him speak: the sound of his voice drenched me like  
Heavy Nile silt.

His eyes were wild, distantly  
Soft: his laugh showed teeth that looked as though they could  
Crack bone. I was caught.

My Venetian suitors had  
Eyes like colored gates of glass, hoarse dry voices  
That spoke butter words,

Perfumed hair, long-nailed hands  
That hid their rotting teeth whenever they laughed.  
And grabbed at my breasts.

They hid their sickly bodies  
With padded velvets, with furs and pearls and rouge,  
Then strutted like men.

My warrior wears no silk:  
All that can contain his scarred black body  
Is bloodstained leather ...

While I have been daydreaming  
Dull thunderclouds have consumed the Cyprus sun.  
A strange wind claws.

Howls like a dying lion.  
Shivering, I turn. Iago stands waiting:  
He helps me below.

His eyes are wondrous green, like  
A merman's skin, or glittering scales from an  
Egyptian serpent.

 

 

 

 

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> The poem was, I believe, inspired by a poem in Sylvia Plath's _The Colossus and other Poems_ (perhaps even the title poem) and copies the pattern of un-metered lines of 7, 11, 5 syllables. What I liked about that device is that breaking the line at an unnatural point creates a sort of very faintly unsettling syncopation.


End file.
